|
Tampa Bay Devil Rays
Scouting Report
By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
| |
In a season of endless firsts, southpaw Wilson Alvarez
will be the Devil Rays' number one pitcher.
(Bob Rosato)
|
During
spring
training Vince
Naimoli, managing general partner of the expansion Devil Rays,
was haunting the clubhouse like Banquo's ghost. One hot,
lazy morning he was doing a walkabout in the cramped
clubhouse, rubbing elbows with his Tampa Bay nine while
dressed
to the nines in a black team jacket and a rep tie with the
purplish splotches of the Devil Rays' logo. "Are you a
patient man?" he was
asked.
"I'm as patient as anyone else," Naimoli
replied.
If that anyone is, say, Naimoli's friend George
Steinbrenner, then much of general manager Chuck LaMar's
good work might be wasted. LaMar, the respected player
development man who was spirited from the Braves to build
the Devil Rays, has issued a
mission statement that can be reduced to, Win some now, win a
whole lot more a little later. "We want to be here for
a long, long time,"
LaMar says. "To be a championship organization that
has the ability to stay at that level year in and year
out. If we start to waver after two or three years, we're in
trouble."
LaMar suggests five years is the proper perspective from
which to judge an organization, though he concedes a
reasonable level of professionalism and victories must come
sooner if fans and ownership are to be placated. "If
you put a team out there that
does not have the earmark of a major league product,"
he says, "the fans will eat you
alive."
The Devil Rays already resemble a big league club—if you
get past the uniforms with the
customized-van color scheme of black, yellow, purple,
turquoise, blue and green that is supposed to represent the
shimmering waters (not to mention the sand, sun
and lush green landscape) of Tampa Bay but looks more like
something Evel Knievel might don before jumping 12 school
buses. There are familiar faces at the corners in Tampa
residents Wade Boggs and Fred
McGriff and some marquee pitchers in lefthander
Wilson Alvarez and righthanded closer Roberto Hernandez. In a
burst of spring optimism Hernandez suggested the Devil Rays
could play better than .500.
"They're not drafting and signing players to be
doormats," says Hernandez, who signed a four-year,
$22.5 million contract. "You don't hear 'expansion' being
used much around this clubhouse." (Indeed, the Devil
Rays prefer to call themselves a "first-year
team.") A premier, positive-thinking closer might seem
extravagant for a team that will be lucky to
have one or two save situations a week, but Tampa Bay easily
can afford a few luxury
items.
The Devil Rays became an instant big-market club after
selling 23,000 season tickets—and about
2.3 million tickets overall—before opening the gates. They
have leased all 65 luxury suites for five to 10 years, have
a lucrative statewide cable TV package, have sold 97% of
the signage at the stadium and have peddled so many ads for
their game programs
that Michener novels look as flimsy as Archie comics by
comparison. Their payroll will be a relatively modest
$27 million or thereabouts, but revenue could rank them as high
as eighth among the 30
teams.
LaMar especially admires the expansion work of the 1977
Blue Jays and the Rays' National League forebears, Colorado
and Florida. But unlike the Marlins, who cherry-picked such
top pitchers as Kevin Brown and Al Leiter before their
deconstruction, Tampa
Bay plans to grow some of its own. The gem of the system is
at least a year away: righthander Matt White, the Giants'
1996 first-round draft choice who became a free agent on a
technicality. The rate of attrition is high and the science
of scouting
pitchers inexact, but the spiraling cost of free-agent pitching
will prompt
LaMar to stay in-house as much as
possible.
The other, quirkier Devil Rays' philosophical decision was
the hiring of a manager with no major league
experience. Of the 10 candidates interviewed, only Hal
McRae had managed in the bigs. Tampa Bay selected Larry
Rothschild, Florida's pitching coach. "We wanted
someone capable of managing in the majors right now,"
LaMar says, "but who would continue to improve
and grow into the job as our own organization continues to
grow."
Of course, growth takes patience, which, as we know,
Naimoli has as much of as anyone. "I hope," the
passionate owner says, "the fans' patience coincides
with
mine."
—by Michael Farber
Scouting Report | By the Numbers | Players To Watch | Projected Roster
|
